The Christmas Rat (9 page)

“It's been a hard week for you, hasn't it?” my dad said to me.

“All that doing nothing,” Mom agreed.

“I guess so,” I said, wishing I could share with them all that had happened. By this time I was afraid to.

“Well,” my mother said cheerfully, “tomorrow it's finally supposed to warm up. Dinner at the Willobys'.” Christmas at the Willobys'—old friends of my parents—was another tradition.

I brought out my gifts for my parents and put them under the tree. As always they would do theirs later after I had gone to bed. After kisses and hugs I went to my room. Must have been about ten o'clock. Had Anje already come? Had he found the rat? Had the flashlight given him away?

I couldn't sleep. But then, I didn't have any intention of doing so. Just to be sure, I set the alarm for 11:45. “What'll I do?” I asked myself. I didn't know.
Something
. I lay quietly in bed, not moving, listening to the sound of my parents as they brought out their presents and placed them about the tree. Since I already knew their other gifts for me, I found myself wondering what they would put in my stocking.

They went back into their room. The apartment grew quiet. After a while I got up and wandered out to the living room. The tree lights were twinkling. The gifts were all there. My Christmas stocking, hanging from the back of a chair, was bulging. This time I wouldn't look. I wanted it to be a surprise.

Feeling frustrated, I went back to bed and lay there, wide awake. The words to “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing” kept going through my head. I was feeling sick. It was the worst Christmas Eve of my life.

I woke with a start. I mean, I sat straight up in my bed, heart beating very fast. Someone was walking through the apartment. One of my parents? Was that the front door closing? Upset, I slipped out of bed, found my slippers and my clothes where I had left them on the floor.

I checked the clock. It was almost midnight! The alarm hadn't rung.

I crept into the living room, gazed out the window. The street below was deserted and still looked dead cold. I looked around at the tree and the presents. Then I realized my Christmas stocking was gone. It made me gasp. I couldn't even believe it. Maybe my parents had moved it. But I doubted it. I mean, it wasn't anywhere.

Was
it Anje I heard walking around our apartment? Had he come in and taken the stocking? What was he going to do with it? Or was taking it meant to be bait—for me?

It might have been. But there was no way I could stay put. I figured I'd go crazy. I had to know what was happening.

I walked down the whole six floors. When I reached the basement door, I cracked it open a little and peeked in. The lights were off.

Holding my breath, I eased the door wide enough to let me squeeze through the gap. Then I closed it behind me very slowly, making sure it didn't click.

I breathed deeply and listened. I couldn't see or hear, but there didn't seem to be anything unusual happening.

I began to wish I had kept Anje's flashlight. But suddenly a really scary thought filled me. That glowing. Maybe the glow—I don't know how—had been protecting me. I didn't know how it worked, any more than I knew what Anje was all about. But, as long as I had it, things had been, like, okay for me. Well, sort of. Only I'd given the flashlight to the rat. Now, he was safe, maybe—and I wasn't.

So I stood there, trying to decide what to do. Maybe, I thought, I could get the flashlight back. I tried to remember where the rat had been heading.

Moving from the door, I started making my way down the corridor, hands before me.

I couldn't see of course, but by then I had a good sense of where things were. The further I went the more I knew that flashlight was gone.

But then I had another idea. Why shouldn't I turn on the basement lights? You know, to make myself feel safer. And the lights would keep the rat in his hiding place. I had nothing to hide. This building was where I lived.

Standing there, I tried to figure out where I was. If the basement door was back there, the electrical room was . . . here.

I moved in that direction. My foot touched something hard. I reached out. It was a wall. When I felt around I touched a door. My heart leaped. Had I found the electrical door so easily? Fingers extended, I groped for a door handle. And found it. Twisting it, I pulled. The other times it had opened. This time it wouldn't.

Had Anje locked it? Did that mean he was expecting me? Waiting for me in the dark?

I turned away from the door, but didn't go far. Maybe, I told myself, I should just get out of there. Why should I care what happened to a rat? Just because it was alive? Big deal. What about me? Didn't I want to be alive? I kept telling myself, You're stupid, you're stupid.

Now I knew that right across the way from the electrical door was the elevator. What did I care if I was heard? I just needed to get back there, call the elevator down, and be free.

I took four steps across the floor and, if my hands hadn't been in front of me, I would have smashed right into the wall.

I felt about. There was a door. It had to be the elevator door. I fumbled for the button. That would be by the side. Cool. I found it fast and pushed it. Except . . . nothing happened.

I pushed it again. A few times. There was no sound from the elevator. I didn't know how he did it, but I was sure as anything that Anje had turned it off. The way I once did to my folks.

Now I was fairly screaming to myself:
Get out of here!
I turned around, moving fast. Too fast. I tripped on my own feet, started to fall, twisted and righted myself. Stood straight.

When I was steady I realized I had turned around so much I no longer knew which direction I was facing. Was the stairwell in this direction . . . or that?

I reached my arms out to full length—fingers extended. No matter which way I turned, there was nothing but empty air.

There I was, in the basement of my own house—The Eden Apartments—totally lost.

Breathing deeply, clenching my fists now, I struggled to keep from getting into a total panic. “Be cool,” I whispered to myself softly. “Be really cool.” The sound of my own voice helped. I tried to center myself. Gradually, I got control.

Find a wall
, I told myself,
and move along it. Move until you find something you know.

Taking little steps, I followed my own orders.

I came up against a wall. Once there, I paused and rested and tried to determine where I was by moving my hands about. There was nothing but hard cement. I kept moving. I touched something. The door that led to the steps? No! Another wall. Walls all around me. I couldn't find the door. . . .

He had trapped me.

I felt so shaky, I thought I might fall. I turned, and found the elevator door. I leaned against it. I could just stay here, I told myself. Until morning. Until Christmas.

That was when I heard a sound.

It came from . . . I had no idea where. It was so small, so quick, I couldn't grasp what it was. I strained my ears. I hoped it would come again even as I wished it wouldn't.

It did. I knew what it was then: a squeak. The rat. He was still alive, moving about. I felt a surge of joy that almost made me laugh it was so stupid. How could I possibly care so much about a dumb, ugly rat?

No sooner did I ask myself than I heard another sound. It was a
click
. I knew what
that
was, too: the sound of Anje's crossbow being cocked.

I mean, he was standing in the dark somewhere with his crossbow cocked and ready to shoot. It came to me that in that darkness, if
I
made a sound, he might think
I
was the rat. Or was it me—all along—he was after?

Oh man, I felt cold, a lot colder than when I had been outside. I mean, didn't he say he thought of me like a rat? And then there was that penalty he said I'd agreed to. Yeah, he was going to shoot me.

And right about then I knew why I cared so much about the rat. Because he was alive. Just as I was alive. I wanted him to live. I wanted to live. I mean, it was Christmas.

Do something to stay alive, Eric!
I fairly screamed at myself.

“It's me!” I shouted out loud. “Me! Eric. Eric Andrick. I'm over here!”

No answer.

“I know you're there Anje. I know you are!”

Again, no answer.

“Can't you say anything?” I screamed. “Come on!”

That time there was an answer from the dark. “I warned you about interfering, dude,” came Anje's voice.

My knees nearly buckled, my stomach churned. “I'm sorry,” I cried out. “I just want to go home. Please! Will you let me?”

“Go ahead and try,” he replied.

“Why don't you let me go?” I asked.

“Because of what you did.”

“What did I do?”

“You wanted to kill the rat.”

“It was you who wanted to, not me!” I screamed.

“Just a test,” he said. “Remember what you said? ‘I got nothing better to do.' So you kill.”

“But I changed my mind!”

“Too late, bud. You're the Christmas rat now. How does it feel to be the hunted one? To have someone after you? Makes you scream to be alive, doesn't it? Or is being alive,” he sneered, “too
boring?
”

Fighting back tears, I knew I couldn't stay where I was, but I could only inch along the wall, hands pressed back against the cement.

My fingers came up against something. I stopped, felt around. It was a doorknob. The door to the steps. I was almost out of there. I gave the handle a twist. This time it moved. It gave a squeak.

The next second I heard a twanging sound, followed almost instantly by a spike of pain in my left leg. I screamed, twisted around, and stayed on my feet only because I was holding onto the doorknob. Then I pushed against it. The door opened. I dove forward toward the steps just as another crossbow bolt whizzed past me.

From the floor I swung, and, using my feet, kicked the door shut. Then, on all fours, I scrambled up the steps.

I reached the first floor. Gulping for air, I stopped and listened. I could hear the elevator. It was moving up. It was Anje—following me like some kind of stalker.

I headed up the steps, running all the way. Maybe I could beat him.

By the time I reached the second-floor landing I knew Anje would get there first. He'd be waiting for me on the fifth floor. I looked down. Blood was dripping into my slipper.

I made myself sit on the steps, next to the door marked
SECOND FLOOR.
I rolled up my pant leg and looked at my wound. The crossbow bolt had grazed my calf. It was cut all right, but I could see for myself it was mostly just bleeding.

I tried to think. Maybe, I thought, I'd be safest staying where I was.

I listened. I could hear nothing.

Using the banister as support I pulled myself up and opened the door a crack. From what I could see, the hallway was deserted. No sound of the elevator.

I let the door close and made my way up to the third floor. There I did as before: opened the door and peeked out. Again there was nothing.

The same on the fourth floor.

And the fifth. My floor. When I reached it, I was afraid to look out. Still, I knew what I had to do. Cautiously, using my fingertips, I pried open the door a little.

I could see nothing, but there was a rush of air. I noticed that the hall window was open.

Did that mean that Anje had left
that
way? Or was this some kind of trick he was playing? I sure didn't hear the elevator. Maybe he was still in it, waiting for me to go by.

My heart thudding, I opened the door further. Wherever he was, no one was in the hall. I pulled the door key from my pocket.

Taking a deep breath, I jumped out into the hall and ran as fast as I had ever run. Reaching our door, I slipped the key into the lock, got the door open, and squeezed inside.

It took me less than two seconds to lock the door behind me. Double-lock it.

Inside, I made my way to the bathroom, where I washed the blood off my leg, trying to make sure I didn't spatter any. I put a bandage on it and I crept to bed.

I looked at the clock. Past midnight. That made it Christmas morning.

I lay under my blankets, shivering with fear. Had I saved the rat or not? I think I had saved myself. I just didn't know.

“E
ric,” my mom called. “You slug-a-bed! It's Christmas morning!”

I got up and checked the clock. It was almost nine-thirty. Considering what morning it was, that really was late.

I inspected my leg. There was a little blood, but actually it was just a scratch. No big deal.

We gathered around the tree.

Following tradition, my dad said, “Eric, open your sock first.”

I went to it. It was stuffed, with a big orange—another tradition—poking out the top.

I lay the stocking on the coffee table. My folks stood around to watch me open it. Big smiles on their faces. The most common things were on the top, the best always at the bottom.

First came the orange. Then some nuts. A package of mechanical pencils. A Swiss Army knife. Candy, of course. Two tickets to a Yankee baseball game in the spring. I was getting close to the end. When I reached all of the way to the bottom I touched something soft and furry.

The rat.

Was it dead or alive?

I touched it again and . . . it moved.

I jerked my hand out of the stocking and held the top shut with two hands.

“Be right back!” I shouted.

“Eric! Where are you going?” Dad cried after me.

I didn't answer. I was down the elevator, into the lobby. I yanked the lobby door, then the front doors open and stepped outside. It must have been twenty degrees warmer than the day before. I mean, there were practically puddles on the sidewalk.